Sb-Te alloy sintered compact sputtering target

#The present invention relates to an Sb—Te alloy sintered compact sputtering target capable of effectively inhibiting the generation of particles.

#In recent years, a thin film formed from an Sb—Te material as the phase-change recording material is being used as a medium for recording information using so-called phase transformation. As a method of forming a thin film formed from an Sb—Te alloy material, a generally employed means known as a physical deposition method such as a vacuum deposition method or a sputtering method is used. In particular, a magnetron sputtering method is often used for forming such a thin film from the perspective of operability and coating stability.

#Formation of a film according to the sputtering method is conducted by physically colliding positive ions such as Ar ions to a target disposed on a negative electrode, discharging the material configuring the target with such collision energy, and laminating a film having approximately the same composition as the target material on a substrate on the opposite positive electrode side.

#FIG. 1 is an SEM photograph of the target surface of Example 2;

#FIG. 2 is an SEM photograph of the target surface of Example 3;

#FIG. 3 is an SEM photograph of the target cross section of Example 3;

#The present invention obtains a sintered compact sputtering target by sintering Sb—Te alloy gas atomized powder or powder obtained through mechanical pulverization.

#Generally speaking, with gas atomized powder, it is possible to obtain powder that is much finer than mechanical powder. In addition, since it is possible to prevent contamination caused by the use of a pulverizer, it could be said that it would be desirable to directly use gas atomized powder as sintering powder. A target sintered with the foregoing gas atomized powder can be processed to make the surface roughness Ra small at 0.1 μm or less. As described later, this is superior in terms of characteristics in comparison to machine-pulverized powder.

#Nevertheless, there is no particular problem in using machine-pulverized powder so as long as it is able to satisfy the conditions of the present invention. Upon performing mechanical pulverization, it is desirable to perform this under an inert atmosphere in order to reduce the oxygen content. A vibatory ball mill or the like may be used in mechanical pulverization.